I was watching TV with my 7-year-old daughter recently when this ad for “Amazing Amanda” came on. I’ve always had an interest in speech recognition technology so this particular doll really caught my attention:
You see, Amazing Amanda “is a doll like no other. In fact, she's the closest thing to a real child that a young ‘pretend mommy’ can have. By responding to voices, recognizing objects and showing emotions with realistic facial expressions, Amazing Amanda establishes an interactive mother-daughter bond that is unparalleled among children's toys.”
This doll is like an android. Through a combination of advanced voice recognition, sensory response and animatronics technologies, this thing is as close to a real child as you can get… or might want to get … I mean it’s almost spooky … in an almost “Chucky” kind of way.
According to the promo on Target’s Web site, Amazing Amanda not only learns to recognize her “mommy's” voice, she also “recognizes objects such as her outfits, toothbrush, sippy cup, various foods and her potty. She expresses real emotions, such as smiling when happy or pouting when told ‘no.’”
“She engages in two-way communication with realistic facial expressions and toddler-speak. She can go ‘potty’ and can even be used to promote potty training. She keeps track of date and time, and offers reminders of upcoming holidays. She has an internal clock which can be used as a lovable alarm clock, and may help establish a normal sleeping and waking schedule for your child.”
All of this is powered by four "C" batteries (not included).
I know there have been slews of toys incorporating voice recognition over the years … in fact, they go all the way back to “Speak and Spell,” which was first introduced in 1978 and included one of the very first voice processor ships developed by TI (the TI TMC0280)
But Amanda is rather … amazing.
But what is really amazing the vast array of different applications we’re finding for speech recognition technology: From “smart homes” where all appliances and communications can be voice activated to “smart cars” featuring voice activated controls to “smartphones” sporting advanced speech recognition processors -- it really is fascinating all the different places where this technology has uses.
And I think this is only the beginning …
You see, Amazing Amanda “is a doll like no other. In fact, she's the closest thing to a real child that a young ‘pretend mommy’ can have. By responding to voices, recognizing objects and showing emotions with realistic facial expressions, Amazing Amanda establishes an interactive mother-daughter bond that is unparalleled among children's toys.”
This doll is like an android. Through a combination of advanced voice recognition, sensory response and animatronics technologies, this thing is as close to a real child as you can get… or might want to get … I mean it’s almost spooky … in an almost “Chucky” kind of way.
According to the promo on Target’s Web site, Amazing Amanda not only learns to recognize her “mommy's” voice, she also “recognizes objects such as her outfits, toothbrush, sippy cup, various foods and her potty. She expresses real emotions, such as smiling when happy or pouting when told ‘no.’”
“She engages in two-way communication with realistic facial expressions and toddler-speak. She can go ‘potty’ and can even be used to promote potty training. She keeps track of date and time, and offers reminders of upcoming holidays. She has an internal clock which can be used as a lovable alarm clock, and may help establish a normal sleeping and waking schedule for your child.”
All of this is powered by four "C" batteries (not included).
I know there have been slews of toys incorporating voice recognition over the years … in fact, they go all the way back to “Speak and Spell,” which was first introduced in 1978 and included one of the very first voice processor ships developed by TI (the TI TMC0280)
But Amanda is rather … amazing.
But what is really amazing the vast array of different applications we’re finding for speech recognition technology: From “smart homes” where all appliances and communications can be voice activated to “smart cars” featuring voice activated controls to “smartphones” sporting advanced speech recognition processors -- it really is fascinating all the different places where this technology has uses.
And I think this is only the beginning …
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